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Permanently convert case?

Permanently convert case?

I know i can go to Edit, Convert, and then select ToUppercase, ToLowercase, ToCapitalized, etc, which applies the requisite case-conversion attribute to the text i've selected.

But what i want to do is make that change permanent, so i can then edit it. Is there a way to do that?

For instance, I have a text, "SHERMAN'S QUESTION IS ANSWERED BY THE DATA PROVIDED BY COMBRINK AND OTHERS". I can readily convert this to, "Sherman's Question Is Answered By The Data Provided By Combrink And Others", by the method I just mentioned.

But i don't like the fact that this method leaves articles, prepositions, and conjunctions capitalized. What i want is, "Sherman's Question Is Answered by the Data Provided by Combrink and Others". But since the change to UC/LC/CC is only an attribute, i have to turn it off for each word i don't want it to apply to, and then retype the word. Might as well retype the whole piece of text, especially if i have any idea that i may need the text somewhere else where Nisus attributes are stripped from the text when i paste— because then it will appear in all caps again, without the case-conversion attribute.

But if i could make the case-conversion permanent, then i could go back and change just those capitals i don't want.

(25 years ago, WordPerfect, by the way, used to convert to capitalized WITHOUT capitalizing articles, prepositions, and conjunctions— it ought to be an option here!)

But at least, how do i convert the case permanently?

John b.

Re: Permanently convert case?

Posted: 2015-06-16 11:31:28

by Þorvarður

Hi John,

johnburnett wrote:what i want to do is make that change permanent, so i can then edit it. Is there a way to do that?

It seems you are using the Format menu (Format > Character Case > Display as Capitalized) instead of the *Edit* menu (Edit > Convert > To Capitalized). There is a difference between the two. You should use the Edit menu for your purpose.

Re: Permanently convert case?

Thanks to Henry and Hamid for pointing out that there were already macros for this in the forum. I was not aware of that.
The Perl macro Hamid mentions seems to be perfect. It didn't change "before" in the following example though:

"ITALIAN LITERATURE BEFORE DANTE"

After I inserted "before" in line number 32, it worked as expected. Thanks again Hamid.
My macro turned out to be flawed, so I withdrew it. This will teach me a lesson. Never write a macro when you are about to go to bed!